Related: Bush proposes $2.77 trillion budget

    WASHINGTON, Feb. 6 (Xinhuanet  By Yang Qingchuan ) -- In a major military strategy blueprint sent to the U.S. Congress on Monday, the Pentagon unveiled its evaluations and visions in areas of strategic priorities, war planning, resources allocation and force structure for the entire U.S. armed forces in next 20 years.

    

U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld (R) and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Peter Pace discuss the military spending in George W. Bush's 2007 budget during a news conference February 6, 2006 at the Pentagon in Washington.  (Photo: Xinhua/Reuters)

The 92-page paper, called as the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR), is the first released report of its kind, since the United States declared its global war on terror in 2001.

    Therefore, it is not surprising that anti-terrorism takes much of the center stage of the document.

    In comparison with the two previous QDRs, this one, for the first time, calls for shifting strategic priorities from conventional wars to terrorism, the weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and the so-called "countries at strategic crossroads."

    However, the changes were seen by many analysts as an adjustment and refinement process, rather than a fundamental overhaul.

    While the new QDR underlines changes which reflects the ongoing war in Iraq and the threat of terrorism, the essentials of U.S. military doctrine are left largely intact, they said.     

    TERRORISM RESHAPES PRIORITIES

    Obviously, the protracted war in Iraq and the ongoing worldwide campaign against terrorism have changed much of the U.S. military thinking and the new QDR is full of imprints of these events.

    The document begins with the declaration, "The United Stages is a nation engaged in what will be a long war."

    "Since the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, our nation has fought a global war against violent extremists who use terrorism as their weapon of choice, and who seek to destroy our free way of life, " it follows.

    U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Gordon England, who is in charge of drafting the QDR, said the military must changes its Cold War-era ways and refocus on "asymmetric challenges."

    Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld summarized the strategic objectives outlined in the QDR in four priorities, namely, defeating terrorist networks, defending the homeland in depth, preventing the acquisition or use of WMDs and shaping the choices of "countries at strategic crossroads ", a term refers to nations which the Pentagon perceives as potential rivals.

    The first three targets are all key elements of the war on terror and the QDR envisions three major measures to meet these goals, including strengthening the special forces, establishing coordination headquarters to counter WMD threats, and earmarking 1.5 billion U.S. dollars to protect the homeland from potential attacks of chemical and biological weapons.

    In the previous QDR released in 2001, the Pentagon laid out the so-called "1-4-2-1" formula for wartime force planning.

    It requires the U.S. military to have enough forces to defend homeland; operate in four "forward regions" in the world; "swiftly defeat" adversaries in two overlapping conventional wars; "win decisively" one of them.

    However, the Iraq war has forced changes on the mindset. Ratherthan operating in the four "forward regions", the U.S. troops now should operate around the globe, said the new QDR.

    The harsh realities in Iraq also led to the document's acknowledgement that the terms of "swiftly defeating" or "winning decisively" may be "less useful" for an unconventional conflict.

    The QDR also urges the military to accelerate important organizational changes to create more agile and expeditionary forces which can win wars with a smaller number of people and few more sophisticated weapons.

    The document also reaffirms the need to restructure troop deployment and military bases around the world, envisioning the military could send troops to any hotspot worldwide instantly in the future.

    Attempting to create an "one-size-for-all" force to deal with various challenges, the QDR stresses that from now on, the war planning should be based on capabilities rather than threats.

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